


Depth of Doubt

by rawkfemme



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-29
Updated: 2016-11-29
Packaged: 2018-09-03 00:10:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8688997
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rawkfemme/pseuds/rawkfemme
Summary: As she sits on the couch, angled to look at her stars, she threads her hand into her hair. She doesn’t sob. She doesn’t wail.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Episode addition to Human Error. Comes after my story "Before the Dawn." I needed to find a way, in my own twisted mind, for C7 to have happened in Endgame. It's just so implausible. Workforce and Human Error are so close time-frame wise, that I personally believe that KJ's memories were still fuzzy when 7 took up with Holo-Chuckles. I may fiddle with this story over time and I may do a follow up from Chak. We'll see.

What the Quarran’s had taken from her in an instant was slow in returning. Her memories flitted back in bits and pieces. Seemingly out of nowhere she’d reconnect the pieces of her shattered self. Easily recalled were the technical specifications of her ship and her years of training and since her technical and command acumen had returned, the doctor permitted her to return to duty. 

With missing shifts, shirking responsibilities, and providing vague explanations, Seven had been acting decidedly un-Sevenlike. After the close call moments ago due to the girl’s dereliction of duty she felt the responsibility to reach out to Seven and to help bring her back to the right path. She calls out to the computer for Seven’s location prior to astrometrics. Holodeck two. Pulling up Seven’s past activity, there have been a lot of hours spent there, probably too many. More hours logged this week that in the past several years, all the makings of an addiction. When she requests her ready room screen to display the recorded feed from the holodeck, it doesn’t really enter her mind that she may be invading Seven’s privacy. Concern takes over. Worry leads the way.

She lets the scene wash over her. Her Amal is there, as is Seven. Quiet and intimate. Close and comfortable. A private moment between two people whom she trusted and loved. She pulls up prior recorded sessions as her heart rises into her throat. A red dress, an abandoned dinner, a heated kiss, and a night in each other’s arms. She is torn between the memories in her manipulated mind of a bonded love, and what has played out before her own eyes. Amal, who had saved her and whose caring made her heart sing. Seven, the surrogate daughter and mentee who still needed patient guidance through her search for her humanity. This man. Her Amal. He’d hurt her before, and in a similar manner no less. She’d pushed him away and he’d fallen into old patterns, old types. The scientist in her urges consideration, and to follow the evidence presented. Her heart concurs. 

He had been patient with her; volunteering to move back into his former quarters, temporarily, until she could find her footing. She was grateful. It would be easier to relearn who she was without having to act and entertain, wearing a mask of confidence that she hadn’t yet earned. She’d needed time, and he was all too ready to give it to her. She was a damn fool for being so taken in by him, and the splintered pieces and moments of their joined lives. Perhaps their bond was not as she remembered it to be. She is flooded with the fears and doubts that almost drowned them in the time before they were “them”. This is exactly what she didn’t want.

She closes her eyes, brimming with tears, as her stomach flips and clenches. Her throat tightens and her hands shake. She wants to escape, to flee, but leaving the safety of her ready room would mean returning to her quarters, the rooms she had shared with him. Crossing to the upper level, the light of the ready room feels too bright and her uniform too tight. Shedding her jacket, she calls for the room to be dimmed. As she sits on the couch, angled to look at her stars, she threads her hand into her hair. She doesn’t sob. She doesn’t wail. She feels hollow, numb. She realizes that he likely left her eons before she was pulled from him. So, she sits and she waits, trying to shake the creeping hand of despair that grips her. She lets the cool of the room and the hum of the engines calm her rapid pulse. Returning her uniform to its proper perfection, she calmly makes a request. 

“Seven of Nine, report to the ready room.”


End file.
